Sacrifice, Sport, and Street Art in 'Le Maroc Utile': Performing and Negotiating 'The Modern' in Morocco and Beyond

本研究项目考察了摩洛哥现代性的政治经济，关注现代性叙事如何被用来证明或改变社会/文化习俗。该项目聚焦于当地方言中被称为“le Maroc utile”[“有用的摩洛哥”]的地区，探索了这一主要是emic（尽管，正如其名称所示，并非毫无争议）的地方类别的概念，并参与了“现代”活动领域的表演和谈判，这些活动主要是在当地居民的生活中出现的。以广泛的国别实地调查为基础的活动领域包括：1)牺牲；2)运动;3)街头艺术，并通过人类学方法进行探索，包括长期的田野调查和其他基于实践的方法。更详细地说，研究的重点是在以下活动领域内和活动领域中被编码为现代的内容的表现和谈判：1)献祭（特别是开斋节献祭节，作为主张什么是现代的关键场所，其实践正在发生重大变化，并且在摩洛哥背景下记录最少）；2)运动（体育运动以及卡萨布兰卡超级球迷的活动，两者都涉及表演，运动中的身体，并作为身份和想象未来“发挥”的关键空间）；3)街头艺术（作为一种特别突出和无处不在的“背景”表演，为现代性、体育、宗教、性别、健康和环境等主题提供了额外的论述）。该项目还关注了被编码为现代和有价值（或消极价值）的东西在家庭中进一步协商的方式，家庭成员参与这些活动领域并生活在这些表演中。通过这些相互关联的活动领域的范围，该项目考察了现代性在一个特定的地方被理解和执行的方式，在这个地方，人们以独特的方式使用“现代”这个概念，在这个地方，被认为是现代的东西正在进行谈判，最重要的是，在与全球关于现代性、现代化和发展的话语对话中。通过与我的对话者共同实践，他们认为这些活动对探索、导航，有时甚至是对摩洛哥现代性的质疑很重要，通过参与这些表演和他们的公众，我的目标是了解他们的影响，以及21世纪摩洛哥现代性的更大谈判。这项研究的第二个目的是将“摩洛哥案例”的发现应用到对现代性和现代化的讨论中，这些讨论已经在全球范围内获得了牵引力，并谈到了我们这个时代的一些关键挑战，包括解决人类世和为他人说话的挑战。

This research project examines the political economy of modernity in Morocco with attention to how modernity narratives are employed to justify or change social/cultural practices. Focused on the region known in the local vernacular as 'le Maroc utile' ['the useful Morocco'], the project explores conceptions of this largely emic (though, as the name indicates, not uncontroversial) category of place and attends to performances and negotiations of 'the modern' in spheres of activity that figure largely in the lives of those who live there. The spheres of activity-based on extensive pre-fieldwork in country-include: 1) sacrifice; 2) sport; and 3) street art, and are explored through anthropological methods, including long-term fieldwork and additional practice-based methods. In greater detail, the research focuses on the performance and negotiation of what is coded as modern within and among the following spheres of activity: 1) sacrifice (particularly the Eid al-Kabir Feast of Sacrifice as a key locus of claims to what is modern and the practice of which is changing significantly as well as minimally documented in the Moroccan context); 2) sport (lay sports as well as activities of the Casablanca football ultra fans, both of which involve performance, bodies in motion, and serve as key spaces where identities and imagined futures 'play out'); and 3) street art (as a particularly salient and ubiquitous 'background' performance that provides additional discourse on modernity, sport, religion, gender, health, and environment, among other themes). The project also pays attention to the ways in which what is coded as modern and valued (or valued negatively) is further negotiated within a home whose family members participate in these spheres of activity and live in the midst of these performances. Through the scope of these inter-related spheres of activity, the project examines the ways modernity is understood and performed in a particular place where people use the concept 'modern' in unique ways, and where what is considered modern is under negotiation and, crucially, in dialogue with global discourse on modernity, modernization, and development. By co-practicing with my interlocutors, activities they designate as important in exploring, navigating, and sometimes contesting Moroccan modernity or modernities, and by engaging with these performances and their publics, the aim is to understand their influence and the greater negotiation of Moroccan modernity in the 21st century. A second aim of the research is to apply findings from 'the Moroccan case' to discussions of modernity and modernization that have gained traction globally and that speak to some of the key challenges of our time, including those that address the Anthropocene and speaking for others.